Healthy feet

Some helpful guidelines for supporting healthy feet

At Rostak our ethos is about providing comfortable and healthy footwear for children and to make this happen we have found there are some simple guidelines to ensure your children's feet are supported. These rules have come out of scientifically defined constructional principles and empirical experience based on a long term cooperation between medicine doctors and footwear specialists. We are mainly talking about the standarts ensuring ortopedic comfort, safety, suitable physical and mechanical qualities as well as the hygienic comfort of used materials.

Around 98% of all children are born with healthy feet. Unfortunately by the time they are adults, 40% of them suffer from pains of the feet and up to 12% of these cases have to be medically cured. And according to the current findings the number of these operations is on the increase.

In the past, the reasons for damage on children's feet were mainly caused by illnesses, malnurition and sometimes exhaustion. Today the greatest concern causing feet damage is ill-fitting children's footwear.

Split feet are a result of wearing shoes that do not fit – they are either too short, too narrow (tight) or too pointy in the toe area. Also wide shoes which allow the foot to slide down to the top can cause serious feet damage. Of particular concern is wearing pointy toed footwear with high heels.

It is common for parents to unknowingly be misinformed when it comes to choosing the right shoes for their children. It can be a daunting task as a number of children's shoes do not follow the basic ortopedic and hygienic criteria within our market – hence at Rostak our footwear is proudly endorsed by COKA (Czech footwear and leather association) who have brought up voluntary certification declaring foot health and comfort of children shoes.

Principles for healthy footwear

Shape of shoes

Children's shoes must have rounded toe caps that provides enough space for toes. The more smooth the inner edge of the shoe is, the better, because the toe is in its natural position and therefore not pushing towards the other fingers. We strongly recommend you avoid wearing modern pointed shoes because this may cause fingers´ deformities.

tvar obuvi

Upper material

Please choose the footwear that is made of natural materials – leather or textile – these are soft, permeable and they absorb the humidity. Their most important feature is that they adapt to anatomic shape of foot.

These are a list of materials which "breathe:“

1.Textile – (natural fibres such as wool, chemical fibres – Polyamid…etc)

2.Leather 

3.Water-resistant footwear with air-permeant membrane (e.g. textile shoes)

4.Gumboots

nepropustny

Insole

Children's feet sweat quite a lot and the biggest source of humidity is found in the sole. Therefore every footwear especially the closed in style's need to have the insole or inlay made out of absorbent material – leather, textile…etc

stélka obuvi

Counter

Feet need to be very well fixed in the shoe to prevent any sideway movements in a heel part of the foot. That's why each children's shoe whether it's a closed in style or sandals with full heal seat, need to be strong enough as well as have a high and long counter within the inner heal section.

opatek obuvi

The style of the top

Good fixation of the feet within the shoe depends on how suitable the style of the top footwear is because this holds the foot against the counter and avoids the movement. We recommend lace up shoes or maybe the shoes with closed belts such as buckles or velcro fasteners. 

střih

Footwear elasticity

The shoe needs to have the greatest elasticity in the spot with the most flexibility. Footwear that is too tough and unrelenting can increase tiredness and interrups the comfort while walking and effects the progress of our children's healthy feet. It is common, that the more thicker the sole is, the more tougher the shoe is. We strongly recommend every child tries on their footwear when buying and for their caregivers to check how big is the resistance of the shoe when turning the toe cap towards the instep.

ohebnost

Dampening characters of shoes

Tough falls on concrete, asphalt or paving effect the health of our bones, joints and auricular cartilages under the limbs. The best precaution is to have soles with good dampening characters.

tlumící

Heel

Speaking about the children's shoes, all heels need to be as low as possible with a large breadth for children equilibration. High thin heels are not recommended for children.

podpatek

Shoe weight

An often overlooked character of the shoe is its weight. Ideally footwear needs to be as light as possible, especially if we consider that the child does 18-20 thousand steps a day.

 hmotnost

What you might not know:

  • only sometimes the left foot is as long as the right one. But mostly the difference is quite visible -  up to 6 mm
  • feet are larger in the evening than in the morning. They gain about 5% of their volume, they are about 3 mm longer and about 1 cm wider – that´s why it is recommended to try on shoes in the afternoon
  • feet are longer when you are standing than when you are sitting – it depends on the weight of your body – the difference makes about 3-6 mm (we recommend you measure your feet only when you are standing)
  • while you are moving the foot gets a little bit longer due to a big press and simultaneously the toe moves forward step by step (that´s why we should buy  shoes approximately 12 mm longer than our foot)

Production costs on creating quality children's shoes are almost the same as adults shoes. We passionately advise families to not compromise on the wellbeing of your children's feet based on cheap footwear. They deserve the best support when stepping out.

delka